Trojans overcome fire alarm, mistakes to beat SC

By Robert Avery, ravery@hcnonline.com

Published 8:56 am, Tuesday, December 5, 2017

CLEAR LAKE – South Houston's varsity boys basketball team overcame a wealth of turnovers and the interruption of a fire alarm to earn a berth in the Carlisle-Krueger Classic Silver Bracket championship game Saturday night.

Winners of three straight, their longest winning streak of the young campaign, the Trojans faced the survivor of the Clear Brook-Aldine Nimitz game for the Silver title.

Draylyn Brown scored a team-high 17 points and Torrence Stevens tacked on 15 as the two helped their teammates fight through 22 turnovers, while Summer Creek committed 16.

Charging calls were the popular infraction on this day.

Then with only 1:57 remaining in the game, the Clear Lake High School fire alarms in the old part of the school sounded, prompting the evacuation of the building.

It lasted three minutes before all were allowed back in.

That interruption could have made things interesting and South Houston's lead only 50-47, but the Trojans extinguished the growing fire by hitting 6-of-8 from the foul stripe.

Stevens made three trips to the foul line where he was 4-of-6.

Head coach Patrick McCoy's club stayed consistently ahead by eight, nine points, even reaching double digits at 38-27, but the deficit had shrunk to six entering the fourth.

South Houston's lead was 46-39 when Summer creek scored straight points to close within 46-44 with 3:55 left in the game.

Stevens missed two free-throw attempts but the ensuing scramble for the ball resulted in Summer Creek las touching the ball.

That proved big because Brown hit a jumper, followed by Jason Hampton scoring after Brown blocked a pass.

Summer creek was directed by the duo of Quontell Shepard and Jakobe Perkins. Shepard finished with a game-high 20 points.